The following are the outputs of the real-time captioning taken during an IGF virtual call. Although it is largely accurate, in some cases it may be incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors. It is posted as an aid, but should not be treated as an authoritative record.
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>> CHAIR: Welcome, everybody. This is a tough first call since our MAG meeting. And thanks again to everyone for a productive open consultation and MAG meeting the week of 15th June. Our agenda is very focused tonight. We are going to look at the action items emerging from the MAG meeting. We are going to get updates from the Secretariat, and then we are going to get an update from the Working Group on workshop process on the guidelines that they have developed for virtual sessions. And then the substance of tonight's meeting most of our time will be dedicated to looking at the design, the overall design and shape of the virtual IGF 2020. The Secretariat has prepared quite a few documents for you to look at and options to look at. And they have summarized the discussion in the MAG list. And based on that discussion and also based on the MAG meeting and the open consultation I have developed a model for a five day IGF and for a two week IGF. And we also need to discuss some of the points that have come up in the MAG list such as the use of an external service provider or support institution such as deploy or tech change or how do we go about that. And there has been some discussion around that. And on that note, I will give back to the Secretariat to let us know if there are any apologies for tonight and then to take us through the action items from our last meeting.
>> CHENGETAI MASANGO: Thank you very much, Chair. Four apologies. We have apologies from Rajesh and from Mary Rose and also Hanna. They were unable to make it. And they sent their apologies via e mail. Those are all I have got. There may have been some that have come in later on but also note those. For the action items for the since our last meeting, that's from the face to face meeting. The first action item was, of course, to put people in to the groups, thematic groups and that has been done. And also it is still not too late. If you want to be put in to a group and you have not yet done so, you can just please contact Luis. And Luis will put you in to that group.
The next action item was for the making of some scenarios for the virtual meeting. And the IGF Secretariat has done that in consultation with the MAG Chair. And we will just walk you through those today as well when the agenda item comes up.
And the final action item that I have was to discuss with the working the MAG Working Group on evaluation on contacting the session organizers and informing them about it being a virtual meeting and also asking them for further details. There was a meeting of the Working Group on evaluation. And I think Roberto may just give us a rundown of that. And we did discuss the IGF Secretariat had a an e mail template ready. And there we did discuss it. We made some changes to it. And the decision since this meeting happened late last week, it was decided let's wait until the end of this meeting, then you will have hopefully further information to give the session organizers. And we have Luis has made a template to the proposals, the questions we ask them and we click it and it is recorded with their workshop proposals. That were the action items that I have. Back to you, Chair.
>> CHAIR: Thanks a lot for that, Chengetai. I think there was at least one other topic that came up during the MAG meeting we might not have resolved completely. And that's whether we should write at all to the Under Secretary General's office to ask for more clarification on what is meant by some of the contents of the roadmap, in particular with regard to the advisory group. And that would be appointed to work with the IGF plus. That came up in the MAG list discussion as well. Also with regard to some questions on MAG renewal. And what I suggest is that we wait a little bit, that we wait for the champions of recommendation 5A and 5B to produce their option paper. And then we look at and the MAG can revisit it whether it wants to send any request for any further information. I think there was agreement that we don't want to send a formal response to the MAG. Some felt it would be valuable to ask some questions for clarification. But my proposal is that we revisit that after the options paper has been made available. And I think this was it.
I think the other open semi open item was the discussion about ISOC's proposal for emerging issues main session. That was resolved during the discussion of the MAG of main sessions. And what I can report is that I have fed that back to ISOC. And they are very open to looking at a different modality of having that discussion outside of the IGF 2020 formal program. So I'm exploring a way of convening a series of discussions, not just with ISOC but also with other institutions that can separately from the IGF and take place earlier, maybe in August or September but still become part of our work of 2020. But I will report more on that in writing to the MAG and get your feedback on that proposal. So I think that was it for me. If there are no questions, then let's proceed.
And
>> I have a question, sorry. It is Rudolfo. I have a question. Are we going to discuss also the issue of high level meeting leaders meeting parliamentarians track under one of the agenda items as been promised last time by the UN?
>> CHAIR: Chengetai, can you please respond to that? Wyman is with us. Maybe he can also respond.
>> CHENGETAI MASANGO: In their outline in the possible scenarios that we have we do have the high level sessions put in. And I will say a little bit about them when we go through the scenarios. So yes, that will be included. It is woven in to the program and schedule.
>> I share my corrections to part.
>> CHAIR: Yes, I think so. There is some reference to how it would fit in to the overall program. And so we can come back to that after the Secretariat has presented. And Chengetai, back to you for more updates from the Secretariat.
>> CHENGETAI MASANGO: Thank you. Updates from the Secretariat, the newsletter was published yesterday. And we do intend to publish a newsletter every single month. So it is going to be a monthly newsletter. And you can find it on the website. And I think it also has been Tweeted out. The next thing is yes, we have also published the MAG real call for the IGF 2021 MAG. And the deadline for that is the is the 25th of August. And I may not have got around to informing all the key coordinators of the various groups, but I am in the process of doing that. So that's one item.
And then the next thing is that as I mentioned earlier, Poland has kindly given us permission to use the 2020 logo that they have made. And I think Silvia as well said that she will help us just slightly alter it because we have to remove the name of Poland and maybe put virtual or something like that there. They do however, this is Poland want to retain the theme of Internet United for the IGF 2021. So they will use that theme Internet United for IGF 2021. They have suggested that as a replacement for Internet United we could use something like towards Internet United. But we can discuss it in the MAG. We don't have to discuss it now because we do have to think about it as well. So we can discuss it via e mail after this meeting. And we will do this, of course, in cooperation with New York as well since the UN is the host. So they will have some input in what they think is a good theme for the IGF 2020, the virtual IGF.
The WSIS Forum started with the WSIS Forum started on the 22nd of June. The IGF, we we, the IGF Secretariat did apply for a workshop session. And we do have a workshop session on the 3rd of August. I would be grateful if we can have some volunteers to help construct this session because it is going to be an outreach session. And I think it is very good to have one. And I would request at least if you could have one volunteer from each region, if you could just e mail me and then we can set up a group and think about how we are going to present ourselves. But this is the 3rd of August. We still have a little bit of time, but the earlier we do it the better.
Also other activities, the MAG Chair and I myself, we did talk to the organizers of Rights Con who are also hosting a five day meeting at the end of this month. And I mean I think all of you do know what Rights Con and I don't have to explain what it is. They are hosting a five day meeting at the end of this month which is, I mean they have some similarities. We thought it would be good to talk to them and find out. And we did get some information which, of course, we can expand later on but their schedule is not out yet. So we can't really see how they have scheduled their meeting, but that's one thing that we have done. And also Ben very kindly has offered to put us in to contact with the Microsoft team. And we can just talk to them as well and see if we can get any insights as well. But that's going to be later.
I think that is all the updates from the Secretariat unless I have missed something else. Let me give a chance from for other people to say. Luis, have I missed anything else? Dema?
>> Luis: Thank you. Not from my side. Thank you.
>> I do (Off microphone).
>> CHENGETAI MASANGO: Thank you very much. Back to you Chair.
>> CHAIR: Thanks. I can also share that Vince Cerf has been in touch with me also offering help. And any in fact, I think one of the things that we need to consider is how to respond to these calls for support in a way that is systematic and that creates a level playing field. So I think if we are going to consider getting support from partner institutions or external service providers we should draw up specifications or a list of requirements so that we can put out a brief because I think whether we are going to receive in kind support or whether we contract support, we will need to document that. But it has been very encouraging to get such a huge show of support for virtual IGF. And I think what I can share in addition to what Chengetai said about our call with Rights Con we also looked at finding a way of creatively sharing the outcomes of other big events like Rights Con event, like ICANN conference, ICANN policy meeting that just took place and finding ways of building that in to the IGF virtual program of activities.
Okay. Let me not waste any more time. Now we are going to hear from the Working Group on workshop evaluation process, workshop process. Thanks a lot to you, Batof, to taking a lot of initiative in facilitating and to all of you for contributing. And Roberto, will you make will you report for on what you manage to achieve?
>> Roberto: Thank you. Good afternoon to all of you. Yes, we had a meeting last Thursday and several of our colleagues of the Working Group were willing to support at this action. We also had the presence of Chengetai, (inaudible) and providing us with all their support. In general terms we were informed by Chengetai that they were planning to send these initial letters which is really important for the proposals to receive as soon as possible. Initially just to know if they are willing to participate in the virtual IGF 2020.
And after according to what we received as input from Chengetai, once we receive or during the time we will be receiving the responses from the proposals, then also in this letter will be announced that they will be provided with support, with guidance in order to know what other technical details they will need to know to prepare the adjustments to the proposal. Of course, it is not the idea is not for them to send a new proposal again. But, of course, they need to clarify how are they going to conduct a virtual meeting. And that's why the group also decided that it could be grouped to have a guidance with the very concrete perhaps ideas for the proposals to think well and to prepare these clarifications. We also received a contribution from Silvia that they are preparing in Asia and Pacific regional IGF. And that's going to be held in September. And they also developed very short guidance that was also some one of the inputs that we have. Currently we have an ongoing document, a document being developed. And for sure we could have it as a base for this guidance, and we need to we will the good thing will be to finalize it very soon. So we could send this guidance, this short guidance to the proposals. So they will have a better idea of how to present. That's what we discussed during the meeting. And the thing is going so fast. So many decisions have to be taken in this particular call before to go further. I'm not sure if someone of the other colleagues want to add something. That will be for my side and the Chair. Thank you very much.
>> CHAIR: Sorry, I was muted. Thanks a lot for that, Roberto. I was wondering if, Luis, if you can show the document and Jutta was just asking. If you can display. It is not very long to that members of the MAG can have a look at it. And my question to the Working Group is you feel this document is ready. You have done as much as you can. And I also noticed in the discussion that you were proposing that interaction between session proposers on how to adjust their proposals for virtual presentations, that the Secretariat should support that. Am I correct? That is your proposal. Roberto, if you can just respond to that, please.
>> Roberto: The first question, I think we didn't finish it yet because there are some aspects, some important aspects that we are going to talk about them in the following minutes. So with that with that other inputs I think we can we will be able to finish the document during the next days.
>> CHAIR: Okay. So you still want more input?
>> Roberto: Yes.
>> CHAIR: Thanks. And if we can have a look at the document.
>> I apologize, it is a protected document. I am going to open it soon. It is it is not open for everyone apparently.
>> CHAIR: That's fine. Don't worry about that. It is important to look at this document. I looked at that tonight. I think it is an excellent document. And I look at the fact that it is brief. And I like that you have approached it not as a new set of rules but as helpful advice. So I think you have found exactly the right way of framing it. And how much time do you want to give MAG members to comment on the document? Do you want to give as a deadline?
>> Roberto: In my site I will think about it the rest of the week, Madam Chair. Do you think it will be good?
>> CHAIR: That's probably fine. Should we give everyone until Friday?
>> Roberto: That will be working. To have something at least a final draft ready for Monday.
>> CHAIR: Okay. That sounds good. Does any one of the Working Group members want to add to this report? And are there any questions for the Working Group?
>> JUTTA TREVIRANUS: It is Jutta speaking. May I step in?
>> CHAIR: Yes. Of course.
>> JUTTA TREVIRANUS: It would be good to get some more input from the other MAG members as well. But also we think it would be good to publish the document or the guidance on the IGF website in parallel to the sending out of these e mails to the workshop proposers. When they get the the response and/or ask whether they would like to confirm the readiness to hold a virtual session then it would be good that they get also the lead to the document so that it is published and that they see what it means for them to commit themselves to continue with that proposal. I'm sorry, I am a bit disabled in my speech because I had a tooth operation today. Sorry for this.
>> CHAIR: Sorry about that. Any additions? I can't see the speaker's queue. I'm looking for hands in the list. And I don't see any. So I think we can thank the Working Group for their work, promise to look at the document and send comments by Friday. And our goal is to have this finalized so we can start communicating with session organizers on Monday. And Chengetai, let's move on to the next agenda item which is going back to the Secretariat. Thank you, Luis. It is so next we will look at how we want this virtual IGF to look, what its shape would be in terms of duration, time zones and so on. Can I hand back to you, Secretariat?
>> CHENGETAI MASANGO: Thank you. Yes, as the Chair has said we are looking we don't really get we don't really want to get down to the real nitty gritty details but looking for some high level advice on the length of the program, design of the program. Whether or not we want it to be the five days, the two weeks or should it be longer. The overall duration of the tracks, whether it is going to be 60 minutes or 90 minutes. Looking broadly at how meetings, this year's TD and other UN meetings and other regional IGFs have been taking their meetings online, they have reduced the number of the length of each session from 90 minutes to 60 minutes. Do we want to follow suit or should we stick to the 90 minutes? Of course, there is arguments for and against. Is one hour long enough to get deep in to the discussion? If we go for sessions that are 90 minutes and we do have over 140 sessions, will Zoom fatigue or online fatigue set in? So we should keep them short sessions and make them and try and make them snappy. So I mean these are all the things that we are looking at. And we are hoping that through the combined wisdom of the MAG since you have all attended online sessions, what do you think would make a good IGF, virtual IGF 2020 meeting. And also the start times, I mean we have had options from one extreme is let's have a 24 hour IGF. Is that a good thing. Let's enable everyone to attend if it is 24 hours. How will people rest, things like that. Or should we weigh it some central time zone where there is a large number of the population. And just shift it to favor the other time zones so that it won't make it impossible for the other people to always wake up at 3 a.m. in the morning.
As far as the Secretariat is concerned, looking at all these things. And as I have said, mentioned before, we have talked to various organizations from outside of the UN. We have talked to ICANN when it has been very helpful, connecting us with the people within ICANN which is who are organizing the virtual meetings. And unfortunately the way that ICANN is doing their meetings they will still be centering them in the time zone that the meeting was supposed to take place in.
The last one, yes, they did weigh it a little bit. They did shift the time so that the people in the U.S. and the West Coast were not too overly inconvenienced. Yes, that's a lesson that we can take onboard as well. As I said we have talked to Rights Con and Rights Con has not published their schedule, but they go out and get a company to do the scheduling for them. They are still using Zoom. So that's one of the things that we found out from Rights Con. As far as the UN is concerned, for CSD they reduced their meeting times. They did it over three days. And they had three 90 minute sessions. So each day they had one 90 minute session at different times. And they divided that 90 minute session in to two 45 minute sessions. So it was a really reduced schedule from what they usually have at their at their CSTD meeting. We looked at the WSIS Forum. The thing about the WSIS Forum they had already approved all the workshops before the COVID 19 pandemic really set in. So they decided that, of course, they would honor those acceptance, those workshops that they have accepted and but they did stretch out over a 12 week period from the 22nd of June to the 11th of September, but they have a very lighter schedule. They have three or four sessions a day. I didn't see any parallel sessions as such, but three to four sessions a day. Mostly one hour sessions. Some of the high level sessions, et cetera, were 90 minutes long. So as far as the UN is concerned, they are going towards a lighter schedule and, of course, shifting the time to suit people but still anchoring it in the time where the support is is based. As far as we are concerned, we are as this IGF Secretariat and, of course, the UN we are waiting for the advice of the MAG. We did look at several factors, one of the factors is that where is the support coming from. The Government of Poland is going to be providing the support for the interpreters. Most of the scribes are based in the U.S.
So those are some of the factors we have looked at. The Polish supporters, I wouldn't call them hosts, but I will call them supporters have said yes, it is possible to have interpretation outside of what you would call normal Polish business hours but the expense goes up. So now looking at all those things and also looking as well as if you look at the letter from the USGA and things that have come up, we should have a more concentrated and focused program. And whether that has been the general trend over the years. So now
>> CHAIR: Sorry to interrupt you there, we got very good feedback on the Berlin program which was quite a big program but it was the thematically coherent and concentrated. We need to be careful about taking the feedback, about having an organized coherent IGF and assume it has to be a smaller IGF.
>> For this IGF we have five themes. That is the focus. From eight themes now we have four themes. So I am not arguing about anything. I am just saying what the general trend has been. In Berlin yes, that was a very good program. And I think we had quite a few sessions. And I think everyone is fine. But again Berlin is face to face. This is virtual. I am just trying to give people things to think about. I'm not trying to tell them where to go but just trying to make everyone aware of all the things that are happening. I mean EuroDIG they did have a full schedule as well. As I said the WSIS Forum has a full schedule and it is over 12 weeks. Should we have ours over 12 weeks? I don't know. These are just things to think about.
But coming back to this, the Secretariat did come up with some options. We have talked about it with the MAG Chair as well and the MAG Chair as well has added some options. We have four options for you to look at. When we look at these options these shouldn't be treated as a yes or no. These are starter points for the discussion. And hopefully at the end of tonight at least we will know a couple of firm things. How long is this suggested duration of the IGF meeting? How many parallel tracks should we have? If we could show one of the first options, I don't know whether it is going to be Anya or Luis can show the first, first option. Nothing here is written in stone. These are just suggestions. I'm not taking anything away from the MAG.
The advise has to come from the MAG. So I think everyone is clear on that. If we could expand it a little bit now with these options, this is the first one. And as I said we have four. So we just built in a one week option and also a two week option. The thing that we have to know about this is, first of all, we did not include the Day Zero events, not including the Day Zero events in this schedule is that Day Zero events are not officially part of the IGF. So the Day Zero events can happen the week before or even two weeks before. It will not break the cohesiveness of the program. As some people have said that this is just some opinions have said that we shouldn't really stretch it out because if you stretch it out too long, people will not remember or will not keep in mind how it all started and will not carry that thread right to the end. So we separated the Day Zero events. And when I say Day Zero events I am not talking about the High Level Events. I am talking about the giganet and those things. These can happen a week before or a couple of weeks before. That's fine.
One thing we also looked at the schedule and it seems that November is fairly free of international conferences that would clash with us. So we do have I think if we were to expand I wouldn't expand in to October. But I would expand from the first week of November onwards because that is fairly free. The ITU had a big conference, but they decided to postpone it until next year. So November is ours basically to fill in if we want to.
I am just giving a heads up to Anya that I am going to pass it on to her to fill in the details here. But the other thing to note is that question we do for the main sessions and also for the High Level Tracks we have no sessions in parallel to it. We would want everyone to be focused on the main sessions and on the High Level Tracks and also with the opening and the starter and closing sessions of each thematic track, I mean yes, they are together but there is no other parallel sessions with that. Last year, of course, we did have some sessions and it really didn't come on. The newcomer session, as well I think the newcomer session can be a presession to the meeting. For the High Level Track we are thinking about having a High Level Track that actually shows the global nature of the IGF and centering it and having holding them in cooperation with the regional headquarters that we have. These are just for illustrative purposes only. It is just to express an idea. We have not really talked to them and found out exactly what they will be really interested in.
If we go here on Monday just to answer the question on timing, we decided okay, there has to be some logic to the way that we are doing things. So let's follow the sun. So the first high level session is centered around SCAT. And we would be shifting the time a little bit to make it more convenient for those for that time zone in Asia. So we would be starting at 6 a.m. These times are in UTC and also stopping at 1700 hours UTC. And that's ten hours of meeting with five parallel sessions. We are using five parallel sessions instead of the 11 parallel sessions. Using the five parallel sessions would enable us to have because we have more than we have 11 rooms that we could use. So if we have five parallel sessions started, then the next session, the next session let's say that starts at 700 hours to 800 hours UTC to be prepared in the other five rooms. There is no changeover and to people waiting for other people to finish. Some sessions do run over. There is no real overlap in that. So people are allowed to run over time a little bit. That is fine. But we do tell everyone that please keep within an hour. This is just option 2.
Our option 1 for the one week schedule, there is an option 2 for the one week schedule where we have one and a half hours for each session. Most of the workshop, workshop organizers did indicate that they would want an hour and a half session. And the arguments for an hour and a half session is that they will be able to have a better, more involved discussion instead of a rushed discussion for the 60 minutes, for the argument for the 60 minutes. As I said, of course, it is that it will make more concise, faster pace and, of course, Zoom fatigue. So we do have to balance these things out, but it is up to you to give the advice on which way that we should go.
So as I said, just to answer the high level questions, so for the first High Level Track is we are really focusing around reactions to COVID 19. And if we do want to make it a little bit wider instead of using COVID 19, it could be in emergency situations or Internet governance in the age of uncertainty. Health indications we are talking about telemedicine. With those implications around that and would be, of course, if you are talking about telemedicine we have to involve WHO and involve organizations, NGOs that are with the health and infomatics, the business and will also try and get also the business as well and as well as Governments. And for Governments we would want to get involve the future hosts of the IGF. We are talking about Japan and also past hosts of the IGF and any other Government that is interested. The Government of New Zealand has been interested. These are ideas. These are not cast in stone.
For the second one is for the high level is the economy track and we want to center that around Africa. And this is around ECA. And we will get the African Union involved in that. And we will also get UNCTAD and WTO business people. And we can talk about micro finance and everything that to do and how they have mitigated the effects of the COVID 19 pandemic or not just COVID 19 pandemic but how they can operate in this age of uncertainty.
The third high level session would be dealing with security and the idea behind this. And please feel free to shoot me down on this as well, but maybe not now, but, you know, on the e mail or you give me a call, security issues because around Europe they are more concentrated on the security issues. And therefore more to give the global community and security issues. As we go on to Thursday as you can see on Wednesday this is 10 UTC and Thursday is 1 o'clock, that is Chile. And we start later in the day and center the time around Chile. And this follows the rest of the parallel sessions, et cetera. And on Friday, we would hope to end off with in New York with an UN HQ, with the Secretary General doing the end Capstone. And we have the Parliamentary Round Table as well. We have put in some networking breaks. And I think I would also ask if this would be sent around the MAG list, if somebody could just e mail it to the MAG list, that you could also look at it. Let me stop here and just ask Anya if you can go through it.
Hopefully I have not spoken too much about it. There is various options. We have concentrated on a one week option and two week with the Day Zeros before the meeting, but if you would advise that we go for a three week option and/or a one month option. Once you have made your decision or given us the guidance we will go back and see how we can implement it and how implement how implementible it is. We may hit upon some roadblocks and the Polish governments may go to the interpreters and find out that they refuse to work outside some certain hours or something. I have no idea what things may come up. But, of course, we will work with that. And we will work with the MAG and also with the community. But let me stop here and just give the floor to Anya to please carry on. Sorry, if I have come in to some of the stuff that you were going to say.
>> Thank you. Thank you, Chengetai. And I hope you can hear and see the files on the screen. Chengetai said it pretty much, what's the logic behind all this. I will go with you and try to reflect on the scheduling of main sessions. The main sessions are not competing in any other sessions. So there are standalone sessions. There are no workshops or other types of sessions in parallel. So as Chengetai said the first week of the duration of the meeting for now that we try to look at, look at is either one week or two weeks. We had a sample of 147 sessions for now that includes the workshops the number of you provisionally agreed during the latest MAG meeting. Includes the open Forum, 31 open Forum and in coalition sessions and also includes the four BPF sessions in seven main sessions. And all that in addition to the introductory and concluding sessions. And then after that the yes, the tracker of five high level sessions plus the Parliamentary sessions. The first week we did assuming that all sessions would be limited to 60 minutes' duration. As you can see the meeting for one week is in the standard times from 2 to 6 of November. We tried to follow the time zones moving the east over to the west. Monday would start at 6 a.m. It would end up at 5 p.m. UTC. That means quite a long day of 11 hours including the break of one hour. Then we would increase the start time for around two hours on each day. So Tuesday we would start at as you can see at 8 and Wednesday at 10 and Thursday at 12 p.m. UTC. The only exception is Friday. It was challenging a bit because the because of the closing through the high level track and wrap up by the Secretary General to make it convenient for his office. And that's why we have just started a bit earlier. So at half passed noon UTC. Because the schedule is quite packed as you can see, very heavy. The suggestion would be introductory sessions are done on a workday before the start time of the meeting. Meaning on Friday the 31st of October and concluding sessions then would also be done on the very first day after the meeting will end. So that will be the 9th of November. Yes. That's Monday.
These colors, please don't take them as anything fixed. It is just an illustrative. Just that you understand the standard is parallel sessions a day. We are making those tracks of parallel sessions following the thematic tracks. Trust you will have the biggest number of sessions. We didn't calculate a lot because we are hoping to understand the final number of especially workshops after hopefully this meeting. So that's for the first week or duration of session 60 minutes. The same structure is applied if we follow the request of the session organizers. We have a mix of sessions that are one hour long and sessions that are an hour and a half long. As you probably know the majority of workshops, of the workshop organizers one proposes that are in the provisionally accepted list of workshops by the MAG requested 90 minute sessions. These sessions are an hour and a half. That's the logic we followed here. And as you can see the only difference compared to the first sheet is we now have longer hours. So those longer hours does range between eight hours which is the late the last day. And we did that strategically just to keep the attention on the closing. And on the Parliamentary session but then other days are much longer. You can see 14 hours, 13 hours, 12 and a half. The concept of introductory and concluding sessions to be on the day before and day after.
The only thing I didn't mention applies to both of these concepts for one week duration of the meeting is that as you can see instead of traditional formal closing, the meeting will be closed by the high level session, the wrap up of the Secretary General which is on Friday the 6th of November. The open mic we suggest to be on the following Monday after we close the meeting which is the 9th of November. This will give us enough time to engage people to reflect on what they have digested during the weekend on the overall on the overall week of the meeting. So that would be for this first week. I'm not looking in to chat. I will move you to showing the structure of the two week meeting. Let me just try to Zoom this. Hopefully you can see better.
The first week would be from 2nd to 6th of November and then having the next week of sessions from 9th to 13th of November. The hours here are much shorter. So it is a lighter overall schedule per day. So this sheet that you can see now is made to reflect that each session, regular sessions would be 60 minutes long while the main sessions would be 90 minutes long. The Parliamentary Round Table would be 90 minutes long and the High Level Track sessions would also be 90 minutes long. The opening session is in newer versions one hour long on the very first day of the meeting. The difference as well compared to the one week duration of the meeting is that now we can integrate relatively easy the introductory and concluding sessions. The four introductory sessions would open the meeting on the Thursday or Monday and then have the concluding sessions that would be hosted on the last day on the 13th of November. Yes, the concept is the same. We have somewhere in the middle of the day meeting day we have the networking break.
What's important to note for this structure is that the main sessions, seven main sessions plus the Parliamentary round table are all reserved for the first week of the meeting. In the second week of the meeting we have the high level track in addition to all the workshops and other types of sessions. Five parallel tracks, that's also the standard. And as you can see the hours are shorter. So they range between six and seven hours. Some are even less. Some are even five and a half. That's for standard of 60 minute duration of session. But if we look, let me just zoom this in, if we look at the structure of the meeting that's going to be stretched over two weeks where we respect the initial request from session proposers, for the duration of their sessions, meaning we have a mix of 60 and 90 minutes long sessions, with the main sessions being 90 minutes, high level track, and Round Table is 90 minutes. This is how how they could look like. So basically we have an increase between two and three hours per day compared to the previous sheet I have showed you that we have sessions for. 60 minutes. Nothing that much of a difference in terms of the previous sheet that you have seen. Just that we have slightly increased hours. There are some challenging days. Wednesday is like nine hours long and Thursday is long. We can work on to balance it better throughout all those days. Move some sessions in the second week.
Again the open mic we would suggest that it goes on the Monday following the end of the meeting. So that would mean 16 I believe November. Just with the idea, with the same idea and logic as for the one week duration, to give the community enough time to digest what was happening throughout these two weeks and then come on Monday where they have a lighter schedule to discuss what's their feedback to the two weeks of the meeting. I think I will just stop here. Chengetai, just say introductory concluding sessions they are integrated right now in the first and last sessions. I will take a look at the chat to see if there are any questions.
>> CHENGETAI MASANGO: Thank you. One other thing is that we would we do plan to give workshop organizers a chance to pick which slot is best for them. This may be based on time zone or based on the time zone that the panelists are or target audience. Luis can make a site, a page, a back end where we can give them three options for a slot. They can pick one of they can pick the three options that they have want out of all the time slots there is. And then we will see how that this goes in. And I think that will also give them flexibility as well. So I think that's the last thing I will say. And I can give it back to the Chair and we can answer questions or continue the discussion. As I said this is just our ideas throwing it out there to start the discussion.
>> CHAIR: Thanks very much, Anya and Chengetai. It was complex to pull this together. And I only looked at it earlier tonight and I missed one very obvious thing. We will need breaks between sessions. People will need not just networking breaks. If you are starting at 600 UTC and you go to a workshop, you need a little break before you go to your next workshop. So we might need to adjust that. Even just five minute buddy break, people will need otherwise your sessions are very long if you look at it. But we can talk about that.
So I have made notes. Let me post it in the chat actually of what high level decisions are that we need to make. Jutta asked for the floor a long time ago. So I am going to let her speak first, but just the list I have here is we need to decide about the length of the overall event. How long do we want it to be. Do we want to concentrate on a five day option or do we want to go for the two week approach. Then the next high level decision would be useful for the Secretariat to consider how many parallel tracks should be at a time. We have looked at five parallel tracks and that's what the Secretariat worked with. There is general agreement that we shouldn't have clashes with main sessions. And then the length of workshops and it is a very lively discussion in the MAG list, in the chat of the meeting about whether they should be 60 minutes for everyone, even if proposers ask for 90 minutes. So that's something else to discuss. Then the number of sessions in total. So we want to try and cut back as Chengetai was saying. Or do we want to keep it more or less based on the normal size of an IGF? And then also comments in the chat about the thematic tracks and mixing them up a little bit. I want to open the floor to everyone now. And I think I would suggest that we really try and make a decision on the length of the event. Are we going go for a two week long IGF with some presessions and some post sessions such as the open mic session or do we want to concentrate it in to one week? I think if we can decide that, and then if we can decide on the length of the workshops, think that would be very useful. So I'm opening the floor and giving it first to Jutta who put up her hand a long time ago. Apologies.
>> JUTTA TREVIRANUS: No problem. I raised my hand when we started the debate on the length of the sessions. We started that discussion when we started that guidance document. Summarize, most people said we cannot impose the length of 60 minutes to all workshop proposals. There should be an option for them, but that is part of the guidance document that we asked them to consider whether they really want to go for 90 minutes and we give them good arguments that also 60 minute sessions work well. And they have an option to decide. And we will see I do think that some of them at least will reduce from 90 minutes to 60 minutes. Of course, not all of them. And I suggest not to impose that.
Then in regard of the length of the meeting when Chengetai said at the beginning it could also be a 24/7 meeting, for 24 hours I got a bit oh, my God. I do think the coherence of the program that we had in the last year was due to the fact that we had this flow of workshops within the thematic tracks. So we produced within the Working Group these flow charts considering which workshops should we start within a certain thematic track and how do we proceed through the thematic track and end up with good conclusions. And I do think this should be our guiding principle for setting up the program that if you want people to stick to the program, be it one week or two weeks, they would need to be able to follow this flow of the thematic tracks. And therefore I am a bit reluctant in regard of the giving them options to choose because then we could definitely not keep that flow of the thematic tracks that we had beforehand. And I do think it helps people to understand how the IGF works if they get in within these thematic tracks some kind of flow over the workshops of these are my two cents. Thanks a lot.
>> CHAIR: Thanks a lot. I can't see the speaker's queue. I have been running Zoom seminars for the last week. And it is partly why I am behind with e mail. We have been working with African Civil Society and our sessions are two hours. They go so quickly. You have people coming in and out and you want to give everyone a chance to speak and not everyone is English speaking. And some people speak more slowly than others and you want to give your resource people enough time, your panelists to speak. I must say that I think 60 minutes is not a long time. If a workshop has been planned for 60 minutes that's fine. We should be careful about imposing a shorter time frame on people. Who next wants to speak?
>> Can you hear me?
>> CHAIR: Yes, you are a little bit far away but we can hear.
>> I am going to speak up. So just a quick comment regarding the extension, I thought would be mentioned about the time goes really fast in the online interaction. So I would not recommend a general policy to use all the workshops 60 minutes. To keep them at 90 minutes. I'm more encouraged people to be creative in the way which they could improve the use of that time for providing more interaction in the session given that we will not all be in together in the same space. The two week program, in order to make a more fair allocation of the time regarding the time, talking from this side of the world it seems for me that maybe we should we can review and make an effort to allocate the starting time a little bit later than what is proposed now in order to try to share the difficulties for the two ends of the world, to adjust to UTC time. In the way in which you propose it now in my view and I understand the others, the other side, but if we in the proposed for two weeks we shorten the program but shorten the program should be (inaudible) maybe a little bit later for one side of the world in order to provide a more balanced allocation of the time. It was just those two small things that I want to add. And the final things that I mentioned is the issue about finding a slot for the session of the track. Combining in terms of not all the time slots are for the same track, especially combine them as much as possible. I know that some parts have a larger number of session allocated. So will not be a mathematical allocation but try to combine them in order to provide facility to people who are particularly interested in one part but they can take more opportunity to participate in the different session and not have to pick one of the five. But if there are they have the opportunity to attend more than one.
>> CHAIR: Thank you. I think that Paul made a similar point in the chat. Rudolfo, you are next.
>> Thank you very much. So I have several comments and observations. First of all, I personally opt for the model, I think it was No. 2, which was one week with 90 minute workshops because for the 90 minutes you said it is normally one hour is not so much time if you consider a first of all, you have to get everyone started. And all the technical details have to be clear. So you are losing already a few minutes. And then you need sometime for a discussion also with the audience. So I think 90 minutes is a good time. And it is quite well doable in a virtual setting. That's for the 90 minutes.
The second option being one week. I think we have to we have to think about the people who want to attend the IGF. And in my view it is not clear or it is otherwise it is quite clear that there are not so many people who will have time over two weeks to attend an IGF. And if you divide or split the thematic track also over two weeks, then even someone who has all the interest in one particular thematic track will also have to reserve two weeks. And that would be unfortunate because it will not be possible for people to spare so much time. So I think one week it is a good format. It is a dense but effective format and 90 minutes. That's for the format.
Is the IGF Secretariat the host of the IGF? It seems to be like it. Thank you so much for all the work. It is great work and it gives us a good point, starting point for discussion but is it the is the IGF Secretariat the host? Is this is this that's the impression that I got. So it is a question that I have. If it is the case, why not. But then perhaps the IGF Secretariat should have a prominent role in this program for opening it or something.
The second one was High Level Tracks. Apparently now with this proposal we do not have one High Level Event. We have five. So we need five times high level people from all the stakeholder groups all around the world. They need to be invited. Need to have dates and time slots. They need to have they need to know who else is invited. Who is inviting them. These are all very open questions. And this is not only once but five times an open question. I think it is too much. And we are probably a little bit late in the process for setting up such large High Level Events, chain of events. I would opt for a high level wrap up like we have it here with the SG. And one high level opening with whoever is the organizer. And then perhaps 10 or 7 high level people. Otherwise I think it is it is getting too confusing, at least in my mind. So whatever the MAG might decide please whoever is the organizer of this year's MAG, please send out the invitations. Please. Thank you very much.
>> CHAIR: Thanks very much. And thanks for asking for the clarification. I think that would be helpful for all of us. And my understanding is that the IGF is being organized by the MAG but the high level sessions are being organized by the UN. But I think the point about the opening and closing and who the formal host is of the IGF is definitely something we should discuss. And I will go in the speaker's queue but a few quick responses to what Rudolfo was saying as well. Let me finish please. If we concentrated in one week, I think then we could consider Maria's suggestion to add one time slot.
Before you respond on the High Level Tracks I was also wondering with these high level sessions I think they are clearer and Chengetai will tell us more is to work with the regional UN commissions. But if we do that, and if they organized as regional events would it perhaps make sense to have them prior to this concentrated IGF. So just to flag that question as well. And Chengetai, do you want to respond on the high level sessions and then we will go with the speaker's queue?
>> CHENGETAI MASANGO: I wanted to say very quickly the host is the UN and the organizing body is UNDESA. So as far as the direction question is who is sending out the invitations as far as I understand it. It is going to be the Under Secretary General of UNDESA who is sending out the invitations. I was just talking overall because I was explaining that the table but Wyman could have spoken as well but I wanted to make it succinct.
>> CHAIR: All the high level track invitations will come from the UN.
>> CHENGETAI MASANGO: Yes.
>> CHAIR: You can come back and say more about the high level sessions later on but let's go with the speaker's queue. Timea.
>> I have a couple of points. I hope I remember all of them that I want to make. I will follow Rudolfo's lead and go with the format first and content second. In terms of one week or two weeks I think there were a lot of good points made about keeping this as concise a time frame as possible. I could go with one or go with two. And I think it is very unrealistic to expect that people will behave the same way in attending an IGF that is virtual than they would behave when they are flying or training or caring to an IGF that is taking place. Somewhere in a different country. When people make the commitment to go a conference either because they are to organize a session or they are speakers or they are just they want to be part of the experience, they have made a commitment to be there for the week. When we are in our homes, we are back at the office, hopefully by the time we will be in our day jobs and I for me it is hard to believe that people who are not as committed as perhaps us MAG members are to the IGF, or the organizations may not be as committed, they could actually take the weekend and follow everything. So we just need to keep that in mind in making the program digestible and, you know, easy to follow and I think that means us having a bit more time and devoting a bit more resources and explaining how this is going to look like, what the tracks are, how they flow from one another. What is the sessions when people should tune in to what I think there needs to be a lot more preparation than us expecting the people will show up. They look at agenda. And they are there for the week. And they will figure it out. I think it would be a difference in terms of how this is going to work.
About the length of the workshops, secondly, I get the points people who say it should be 60. I get the people who say that it should stay, but I want to caution the attitude of people towards interaction is different when we have chat in front of us. When we are sitting in the room the only way to manifest our comments, our contributions is through taking the mic and speaking. When we are in an online setting and I am speaking and I see people adding plus ones and see people having questions and having side conversation and that's all fine. So I don't want us to think about we need those 90 minutes in the way that we need them in a physical event.
And that leads me to my third and final point on the organizational matter, and is we I think we need to get away from the mindset that we are putting cameras on a live IGF and broadcasting it over the Internet to anybody who is interested in tuning in. This is an opportunity to think about how we can change soflt sessions that we are used to in to, you know, something innovative, something that is new. Something that is different and requires people to make use of the online tools that are available for. I am not sure we need the open mic this year the way we used to have it in the previous years to people by one making an intervention. We can have an open mic throughout the week. We have it in the Twitter feed. We can have virtual Post It notes. People can add, you know, comments. There is a lot of things that we can do, but don't that have to be transposing the physical event in to the virtual world. We can be a bit outside of the box and that can also save us some time.
And in terms of content, I actually agree very much with what I think with Jutta who said there needs to be a continuity and flow of sessions. I think we worked a lot of that in the year in terms of narratives and that should be our guiding post if at all possible. And I think we need to make sure that whatever we decide we get on organizing it as soon as possible. And for that again I would caution that we need to know not just who is hosting, but also who is supporting and how this IGF, it is great that we have the Polish host or next hosts supporting us with the interpretation, but we also need to know what does it mean. What their budget is. How far we can stretch with their generosity and questions like that. The more we know around those points the more realistic we can think about we can do it for the event. Sorry for taking so much time.
>> CHAIR: No. Thanks very much. That's really valuable input, Timae. I think we need to design this as a virtual experience. We cannot just try and run a normal IGF as an online event. I agree with you completely. And that's why I personally feel very strongly that we need to get expert advice in supporting and designing the event, in a way that Rights Con and some others have done. I think we can really benefit from that. Paul, you are next.
>> PAUL ROWNEY: I don't want to repeat what has been said. It is going to be difficult for many participants to put aside two weeks. I think even one week might be a bit tough as Timea said. It is different not being present. You are dragged in to a whole host of other things, particularly during work hours. For me early mornings, evenings are the best times for me to engage on sessions like this, with some during my working day. I would really support spreading the workshop sessions in particular throughout the clock. Not necessarily back to back but in different time zones. You get a less cramped agenda. I would allow the workshop proposers to have some input upon to whether it should be 60 minutes or 90 minutes. We can think about that. I would also allow them to give some indication on their time zone preference. I'm sure a lot of workshop proposers would like to host their workshops outside of those suggested blocks of hours.
On a side note I am just wondering whether we should also allow the workshop proposers because it is online, they might want to do it in one of the other UN languages. I think the main sessions, High Level Tracks they could stick to these UTC time zones. And when we are looking at the thematic tracks, I don't like the idea of concentrating a track in to a slot having five parallel inclusion sessions. Doesn't really work for me. If someone is interested in the inclusion track they are forced to choose only 20% of that track. Basically one out of five. So I would spread thematic tracks across. I hear what was said about trying to maintain the flow, but I think the relevance on virtual against physical stall sessions. Thank you.
>> CHAIR: Thanks a lot, Paul. Next we have Jennifer.
>> JENNIFER CHUNG: Thank you. Hopefully I will be heard.
>> CHAIR: You can.
>> JENNIFER CHUNG: You don't want to mention what the other colleagues have mentioned. Still trying to digest some of the draft scheduling that the IGF Secretariat has prepared for us. Thank you very much for that. It helps very much to be able to see the possibilities on the screen. I do want to agree with Paul and other colleagues who have mentioned in chat that we should not have the same thematic track at the same time. It would kind of it would trying to find the word here. Need more coffee. It would not allow people to be able to attend all of it if they are very interested in one particular thematic track.
On the second point I wanted to emphasize is something that Timea brought up, this is not transposing an in person physical IGF in to something virtual. We need to look at the ideas. What you mentioned about learning from other conferences. There are many tools that enable us to include even more people in the setting. And I think it would be doing the community a disservice we don't look in to all these options and learn from the other meetings.
One thing is the networking breaks and also just breaks from the entire program. It is not simply a matter of limiting the session or content time. It is how you manage to keep the focus and engaged the audience and having strategic breaks would go a long way. Two week schedule, I don't have a preference yet, but I do see there is one advantage that the IGF Secretariat did prepare is having the main sessions in the first week and then the high level tracks in the second. Might give us an interesting opportunity to feed that main session discussion that we have in High Level Track discussion as well. I don't want to use the word complain, but we always wonder if the discussions we have in the community on the ground really percolate all the way up to conversations that high level Ministers or other high level people would have on the same subject. So this is an interesting opportunity that we can look at. I am not sure I have a final say on my preference of one or two weeks, but this is something that we can definitely consider.
>> CHAIR: Thanks. I really echo that and I want to make an additional point which we haven't yet considered and think it is really linked to what you have said and what Timea have said as well. We need to think about the outcomes. We know that we want to produce a more outcome oriented IGF. Very compressed IGF with lots of short sessions and that are compressed in to one time zone. It is not going to make it very easy for us to process the discussion, to make the discussions feed in to one another. The workshops in to the main sessions and to produce coherent outcomes and we do think we need to consider if we want to produce a coherent IGF where the discussions generate good outcome, a slightly longer time frame would be easy to manage. I think the primary take away from this discussion is really that we can't try and take a face to face event and just put it online. This needs to be conceptualized IGF. And we need to take that. I am not sure if Chengetai, whether we feel we should go back to the drawing board with the feedback. I think we have made some consensus decisions. We shouldn't pressurize people to have their workshops run for 60 minutes. I think there is consensus that we need to make sure there is enough breaks. And there is some concern about spreading it over time, but also some advantages about from spreading it over. This is a strong voice coming from MAG members that we need to design this as a virtual process. Not just as a normal IGF that is put online. Let me get back to you. Is there anything else you feel that we that we should try and reach a more concrete decision on tonight?
>> CHENGETAI MASANGO: I didn't get a summation of the overall duration. I mean we have narrated it down to a week or two weeks. Are we able to narrow it down
>> CHAIR: Maybe we can run a poll. I think we have heard people speak in favor of one week. We have also heard some people speak in favor of the longer period. I think looking at the one week program we wouldn't be able to run it in one week unless we add more time slots. So is there anyone else who wants to speak to this issue of whether we should run it over two working weeks or over one week?
>> Hi. Are you able to hear me?
>> CHAIR: Yes, go ahead.
>> Hi everybody. This is Susan Chalmers from NCIAA. I wanted to voice my preference for a one week program even with the understanding that that might that necessitates the addition of time slots to schedule. But I do agree with the arguments around cohesion and the focus. And I'm thinking also of the ICANN meetings. I think that one week would help keep everything concentrated and keep people paying attention and attentive. Thank you.
>> CHAIR: Thanks for that, Susan. Chengetai, my take away from this we need to look at what we want to fit in and then get some help from someone who is experienced and skilled in designing this type of event. So I still feel that we can we can achieve it in less than two weeks if we have to. But we would have to design it in a way that can allow for that. So as Paul Rowney was suggesting, for example, having a broader set of options for workshop time slots. I think it can make sense to have the main sessions concentrated in UTC time zone, but you don't see why we can't have a workshop time slot that is broader. So I think, you know, let's hear a few more people. We will have a little bit more time left. And then it is a case of going back to the drawing board for the Secretariat is we try to get some expert advice and doing something that is creative and innovative. I don't see any other hands which is very unusual. So if there are any other MAG members who want to contribute at this point, it is a lot. It is a lot to work with.
Perhaps to ask you about something that Chengetai did raise but that's the idea of taking events like the Day Zero proposals and we discussed the Dynamic Coalitions and having them prior to the IGF. They would be able to feed in it to the IGF outcomes and messages, but we could do them in the week prior to the IGF. Is everyone okay with that idea? No objections to that, to separating them a bit from the main program?
>> If I may step in, Ben has already asked a question in the chat. And I do think that's very important information to decide on this. For example, how many Day Zero sessions have been accepted and would go in to the program to see how this Day Zero if it is the day before or if it is in the week before would look like. Could we get that information from the Secretariat?
>> CHAIR: Chengetai, can you respond to that, please?
>> CHENGETAI MASANGO: At the moment we have 47 Day Zero events that can be accepted. Of course, we can always reduce it. And we can try and make it fair by a stakeholder group and region but speaking at the moment it is 47. And as I said we can reduce if need be. If it is a week before then we can give everyone the room because it is it is no bother to us. But yeah. That's the numbers.
>> CHAIR: Chengetai, and this idea I raised earlier, I know that Wyman is on the call, of rethinking the High Level Track a little bit to go back to your earlier idea of a few weeks ago. Of having the high level, regional High Level Events run earlier, and then bringing them together in one high level session during the IGF. Just having them the outcomes of all the regional high level event and come together instead of having those four high level sessions during the program. Is that something that UNDESA could still be willing to consider?
>> CHENGETAI MASANGO: Yes, as I said this is a plan. We could have them or we could have them after because everything is supposed to feed in to the High Level Events. A time for high level leaders to take note of what has happened in the IGF. It is still possible to have them after the main event as a summarize a as a summary, bringing everything together. So we are bringing everything together based on the key topics and then bringing it together finally with the last session. So yes, I mean as I said we we are flexible, but this has to be I'm just a mouth piece at the moment. This has to be discussed with UNDESA.
>> CHAIR: It would have to be discussed. But Rudolfo's point of organizing five high level sessions plus a Parliamentary round table, it is a huge, huge task. Silvia, I have noted your comment in the chat. Do you want to speak? Silvia is proposing if we are to cut sessions we should start with pre events and open Forums. So that's something else to consider as well. By the way the Secretariat has not had a chance to communicate with the Day Zero and open Forum proposers to find out if they are still interested. The indications, they are still interested but still a chance that some of them might want to rethink some of their plans.
And I think that we need to bring our meeting to an end. I think there is a lot of food for thought here. I think I am I think there is need to go back and look at this program. I think it is very helpful that the Secretariat designed this for us because it it is visual and we can actually get a glimpse of what it could like look. And we now need to go back and I think the message that I would like us to leave this meeting with is to really look at a virtual IGF as an opportunity and not as a burden. And to make it exciting and make it a really positive for the people who attend the IGF. That means we have to take the timing in to account. We have to make sure it doesn't run over too many days, but maybe it is possible for people to participant fully in the event. It is a case of going to the drawing board and taking guidance that the MAG has given tonight onboard. Chengetai, any last words from you? Or anyone else on the Secretariat or any questions that you have for the MAG?
>> CHENGETAI MASANGO: I think it has been a very useful discussion. I mean we have come to some solution. It is very clear that, for instance, on the session length that people don't think that we should be imposing 60 minutes. And we could offer that to the workshop, to the session proposers. And we will get some whom may want to reduce. Yes, it it has been very useful. And it has given us at least some direction to go to. Thanks. I don't know if anybody else wants to say anything from the Secretariat. Please feel free to.
>> This is Wyman.
>> CHAIR: Yes, please go ahead.
>> Hi. Yes. This is Wyman, UNDESA. I must admit that I was in this session but not throughout. I was in another couple of I want to echo what Anriette to look at this virtual IGF as an opportunity. I don't think that we can have a perfect solution. It will require learning from the ongoing things, especially the UN or the inter the global meetings. But at the same time there is also a need for perhaps some experimentation or calculated risk in order to get a desired result and that includes outputs to have impact for outputs. I think that's key. On the point that Rudolfo and some other MAG members the IGF is convened for the Secretary General. We don't have a host country. And it is virtual in a sense. We can see that the Secretary General is a host and for that this is delegated to DESA to work together with the rest of the UN system. That remains the same. I agree that we have to decide and we have to extend the invitation. We need to move fast to let you know at the same time we are also putting together other virtual events towards the end of the year, some as early as September. And I could share and you would expect that we do not have other high level speakers, including head of stakeholders to speak at the GH general debate this September so that is two months earlier than IGF. So but just to echo, Chengetai, this is actually very helpful to get the different views. We just have to in a way kind of to see what could be the best way. It will not be the perfect way and to bite the bullet and move forward. Thanks and back to you.
>> CHAIR: Thanks a lot. Carlos Afonso, you asked for the floor. Please go ahead.
>> Do you hear me? I have a new microphone. That's why I am asking. Okay. I was wondering about Day Zero. And Day Zero was considered sort of the space for the host country to decide in coordination with the Secretariat. And Day Zero, the events of Day Zero didn't have the requirements that we used for the e workshops. They didn't need to be multi inclusion or multi whatever. But they stood up because of the importance of their theme to be discussed and some of the relevant participants. I remember that when I was weighting workshops some of them look like a very good proposal except that they failed miserably. And then I wonder if this could be good proposals to be considered for Day Zero. I don't know what happened in this regard because they remain there as good proposals. But who decides if they could go to the Day Zero or not. Maybe they are already on the list of 47 that Chengetai mentioned. It would be good for us to take a look at that list. Thank you.
>> CHAIR: Chengetai, do you want to respond to that?
>> CHENGETAI MASANGO: The list is available on the website. Everything is on the website. The Day Zero applications, everything is there. So if you want to take a look, please.
>> CHAIR: So all the applications are on the website. But they have not yet been formally approved.
>> CHENGETAI MASANGO: Exactly. Those ones on the website are the ones that fit their requirements as such. But we have not formally approved them. Yes.
>> Yes, yes.
>> CHAIR: Sorry. Go ahead.
>> Yes.
>> CHAIR: Let me just clarify, you said there was some workshop proposals.
>> Yes, that's the idea. I wonder if some of them made it to the list of 47. I will take a look.
>> CHAIR: Have a look. But we have closed the workshop evaluation process. It would very good to know if people put in the same application to the workshop call as well as to the Day Zero call. So that's something we should but I suspect the Secretariat would have picked that up already.
>> Yes, a final note, here it is that I whether detected that would be possible I put a note in my comments to the workshop proposers regarding this possibility of going to Day Zero. I don't know if they consider it or not. Thanks.
>> CHAIR: Thanks very much, everyone. Are there any other matters that anybody wants to put on the agenda? I don't see anyone. So on that note I think we need to close the meeting and take all your input onboard. And go back and look at offering some fresh approaches. Adopting some of the ideas and also exploring the possibility of getting some expert advice to help us with this design. Chengetai, any last words from you?
>> CHENGETAI MASANGO: None from me. Just thank you all for attending and thank you all for participating. And thank you very much, Chair.
>> CHAIR: And one last thing, Chengetai and I discussed this earlier today, we thought it could be useful for us to have a call next week so that we can get more closure on this issue of how to design the virtual IGF. So would be would people be willing for us to have a call next week instead of in two weeks? Or should we stick to the two week schedule? Any strong feelings? I am going to look at what people are saying in the chat. I can see it looks like there is a strong feeling that we do need to get closure on our next steps. And so I see there is a variety of responses. So I am not going to make a decision on it then. I will let Chengetai have a look at that. But I am warning you that we might be asking you for a next call. If not everyone can make it that would be that would be a pity, but we should possibly go ahead at least with covering some of these issues again. So I am Chengetai, do you want to propose a time now or would you do that by e mail?
>> CHENGETAI MASANGO: We have natural rotation is 11 UTC. Correct me if I'm wrong.
>> CHAIR: It is our earlier time slot. So we will let you know definitely whether there is a call next or in two weeks and then the next time the call takes place it will be in that 11 UTC time slot. So thanks very much everyone and this is difficult. But we still have enough time. And we will get through it and we will make good decisions. We just have to go through this difficult period until we have got clarity on the design of the event. So thanks for your input. Please remember to comment on the Working Group on the workshop process and document. If someone has not yet sent a reminder to the MAG list with the URL and Roberto, if you can do that so that we can finalize that document by Friday so our next step is to communicate with workshop proposers.
>> Sure.
>> CHAIR: With that I close our meeting and wish you all a good night and good rest of your day.
>> Thank you very much.
>> Thank you.